Performance Notes

A few years ago friends of mine had a baby, who emerged with an awfully-full head of sandy hair that at times seemed to showcase frosted tips. People often asked my friends which stylist they used for their newborn... If they had needed to go somewhere to trick out the little guy, though, they might’ve wanted to check out this place, my venue tonight for the fabulous first-Friday BeatWalk event. Holiday displays (buy! buy!) have displaced us (brought Dave and Erin along) from the front window, but there’s nice space in the back—only catch (aside from low visibility): one of the items for sale in the store is the classic egg-shaker, and the kids on hand’ve found ’em (more snare, Dave...).

Sat., November 15, 2008Boise, ID: House Concert

A house concert just as it should be: good folk (& good food!) filling a good room. Great hosting helps, too...!

I suppose this is a good economy to have work (especially in my field), but I’ve been worried my scrambling around will lead to a slip-up sooner or later, and tonight it happens: I can certainly get by without the forgotten tuner, and could get creative without capos (capoes?) if I had to, but I didn’t askAmanda to come all this way not to be able to play the songs in her keys... Thank goodness this’un starts on the early side (and traffic wasn’t bad!), and perhaps the two new capo(e)s I now own will live in my car’s ashtry near the extra cable, mic stand, guitar stand, and D-I that travel with me after having at one time or another been a ‘forgotten item.’ Otherwise, nice show/crowd...!

Did learn this to pass along, however: if you’re gonna run from one showcase to another, flouncing into the second just a bit late to back up another singer, make sure the folder of charts you have is really full of your charts and some a similar manila folder full of someone else’s e-mail printouts. Just FYI.

Seriously? 85° & sunny...in Chicago?? With co-bills bailing left and right (is it me?), couldn’t ask for better last-minute luck than FARM-fatigued (Sandy) Andina & (Stephen Lee) Rich. And the guilty friends making up for a half-dozen years of blowing me off by driving from Lansing (where a mutual friend just got hitched) to catch the show doesn’t hurt, either... Nice room (is an annual visit now tradition??), sound, and crowd—I’m content! (UG records and streams shows there—check out the ‘Radio’ links if you like...)

“Almost too nice for church,” one woman says to me slyly while soaking in a ray or two on the stoop before the service. Hard to find strong fits with the Association Sunday plug—though community, as ever, abounds and folk’re willing to go with me—so what’s the harm in plugging my dear Reverend-cousin’s own work here? Now, off down the road...

Sun., October 5, 2008Big Rapids, MI: House Concert

It’s a delightful family affair again, with one young removed-cousin wishing it were her show. Great visit, potluck, and after-excursion to the family farm...

Ominous to see a road sign pronouncing Flint, MI, “CLOSED” on the drive up (perhaps it referred only to a stretch of I-475...couldn’t snap a pic in time, though we’ll see how the ones of the giant, in-transit pumpkins turn out). I do love neat spaces, and the White Crow is certainly that!—converted church with stage, studio, teaching spaces, in-house store, and fearless cat. Veeerry mellow pace to the evening.

Well, I feel bad about this: I put a photo of the wrong “Boston to Austin” group on the poster—but hey, no one else made a poster... These B2A gals make a fine co-bill, as does the velvet-voiced, improv-skilled Robert (Sarazin) Blake, an old chum of Amanda’s...speaking of whom, after finally memorizing her new last name re: on-stage reciting, gotta start over with Erin. Interesting crowd/room tonight, but after so many Thursdays here we wanted to see what we might be missing.

In my family, it only takes once for something to become a tradition (in fact, I’d wager we have some ‘traditions’ that we’ve never actually carried out), so mychoice of shirt this year is an obvious one. And though they tried their darndest to get me double-time Saturday when the performer scheduled before me cut it close re: arrival time—and then effectively yelled “psych!” when the stage-power went out just as I was to go on (the blender from the smoothie-hut overloaded the breaker, I later hear...thought about announcing “smoothies on me!” during select others’ sets just for grins)—the extra slot comes Sunday when a projected no-show really doesn’t show... Nice to get at least as many positive comments on the performances themselves as the emcee work this year (I think folk’re just really used to bad emceeing at folk festivals...). Still a favorite event of mine.

Can’t believe they’ve let us do this for ten years! I’ve never seen a crowd so big for any UUCP summer service (others concur), and though Dad and I’ll happily claim it, I’m sure it owes for to the imminent departures of one-time UUCP Music Director Cathy Green and Gospel Sunday Celebrant (and co-founder) The Rev. and newly-Doctored (maybe newly-‘Doctorated’—no plastic surgery involved...) Tami Moore, headed to Oklahoma...along with the Sonics... Love it when they come to sing!

The best-laid plans... Drew up two sets tonight, plus a special five-song attention-grabber to insert whenever the mainstage show let out, but in hindsight I recognize two fatal assumptions: one, that we would have ample time/space to set-up; and two, that the esteemed mainstage headliner would not wrap before we were even underway (or all assembled for that matter...though nice of him to stick around for some of the set!). Once we settled some—which likely took me longer thaneveryone else given my personal makeup and the fact that I’d just come from a memorial service (R.I.P., Jim; glad to have known you)—’twas a nice evening in a fun room with a good (if occasionally over-enthusiastic) crowd. Whew!

People come to Seattle and remark: “Wow!—water and mountains everywhere!” But all through my first twenty-four hours here in Alaska I find myself exclaiming: “WOW!—water and mountains everywhere!!” What a neat, unpretentious event in a marvelous setting (as billed) where one can walk anywhere (even to the airport to hop a John Deere ‘bush-plane’ back across the bay) and a tremendous community feel (even before a ton of family showed up!). Can’t wait for my next excuse to head back!...though the daylight plays with the sleep schedule quite a bit...

My problem is that I don’t exaggerate like others do. I don’t drop ‘-est’ tags on everything, proclaiming each item I encounter in daily life the best, worst, or most-incredible thing ever, yet people shrug off my judicious superlatives as bombast or white noise just the same, assuming I’m like them in that respect (I’m not). I have, as folk point out regularly, a pretty good understanding of the English language, and if I need to use particular words—especially in writing—I will...so pay careful attention: whatBrian Hoskins is doing with his choir program at Nelsen Middle School is nothing short of remarkable and unlike any other comparable outfit in the region and likely beyond. What other middle school director is commissioning original works from internationally-renowned composers, flying others across the country (twice!) to deliver Gospel goods to people who need to be told, tackling works last seen by the Seattle Men’s Chorus...and premiering works by a local singer/songwriter who thinks he tells it like it is better than you do (he does)? What other seventh-grader gets to sing at Seattle’s Paramount Theatre without American Idol-style humiliation? What a gift to the community and to the lives of these students and families!!

Again, if I could get these folks insurance (and convince ’em that their own abundant, additional undertakings should take a back seat) then I’d conscript all to WW band life full-time. Alas... Alicia opens with a set of her own and then the full outfit takes it the rest of the way for a nice house (and one local celebrity-type—who might’ve proved helpful at the other in-town attraction this evening) kept up past bedtime on an almost-springlike Thursday in the Northwest-People’s Republic. I’m happy to bring this group in any time; wonder if the film turned out...

Sun., April 20, 2008Oysterville, WA: Oysterville House Concert

The entire community of Oysterville lies on the Register of National Historic Districts (and has since 1976), and my host (Oysterville gentry herself) has much to do with the town’s present presence and preservation (say that three times fast). Great crowd, enthusiasm, and all-around gig, and I much enjoyed the walking tour (Sydney and Nyel live in No. 13, across from the church) and visit afterward. I eagerly await a return: ‘Oysterville’ is not just a clever name.

The Crossroads contract reminds performers that “our audience takes offense to comments like ‘I can’t believe I’m playing a mall’ and other put-downs of the venue”—which is perfectly appropriate given the wonderful,previously-espoused live-music-model-in-unlikely-setting this particular mall has maintained for sixteen years—but you try keeping your cheeky, in-the-knowrhythm section in line for two full sets...on Brian’s birthday, no less! Good crowd as usual, and fun to debut a few new numbers/arrangements: Bon Jovi was meant to take the form of an acoustic waltz...

Not much one can do when the whole town has the flu... Still, sometimes the connection one makes to those in modest house-concert attendance—especially in such a strikingly-comfortable setting—is worth more than trying in front of scores in a noisy barroom. Fun, woodsy conversation before and after (learned about the Miner’s Cat), and figured this would be as good a time as any to attempt this forgotten chestnut, recovered a few days earlier whilst visiting an old friend who had unearthed a film from 2002.

What a cool model!: like other societies, etc., Strings members for their dues get great live music in a fabulous space and the chance to visit with one another at the regular events, hosted for fifteen years by one Joey Lent. Splitting a bill with Doug Blumer—late of The Westerleys and a truly great songwriter/entertainer/personality/presence—and pleased to be doing just that; nice pairing and fun night. These folk came to sing!

If the spirit and benevolence it takes to host a house concert aren’t asking enough by themselves, TrueWind hosts Bev Barnett & Greg Newlon are doing it mid-remodel...and hosting a potluck and post-concert song-circle too! (Well, the potluck helps when you have no operable kitchen...) Nice in-the-round grouping/sharing, but the highlight comes after when the gathering becomes an episode of This is Your Life ambushing co-bill Ginny Mitchell, who finally discovers that the amiable gentleman who has sat right in front of her all night is in fact the very fellow whose dubious cover band played her eighth-grade graduation thirty-plus years ago and whom she has been trying to track down for more than a year. Love it. And better than thelast time I was in-area.

PFS and my cronies with Seattle Folklore Society have collaborated some with bookings this season, and this month comes a special Portland/Seattle songwriters in-the-round billing in both cities: me; Val D’Alessio; Dan’l McIlhenny; and Joni Laurence. Always interesting to trace the musi-conversational thread in ITR settings—didn’t think we’d stay on goats for two full passes...

Yes, greater-Vancouver is effectively tropical Canada, but I still think all Canadians should know how to drive in the snow as a requirement for citizenship (though it is really coming down). Still, some hearty souls make it out to Pam Southwell’s welcoming abode—likely winding (or sliding) their respective ways there more efficiently than me (how many darned Dewdney Trunk Roads are there?!)—and a nice night is had by all.

Another Gospel-y MLK service with Rev. Jim-Bob at UUCP. Got a title this time: Guest Soloist (with the choir).

Sat., January 12, 2008Seattle, WA: House Concert

Took away from the recent FAR-West conference the sense that house concert presenters want some video content...so I thought I’d film one. Thanks to Dustin Patterson (camera) and Alicia Healey (sound):